Let’s take a look at the biggest and best comedy movies of 2016. Funny this year has come in the form of De Niro as a dirty grandpa, Sacha Baron Cohen as a soccer hooligan, the return of Bad Santa, and a wild Sausage Party. That and so much more. Let us know in the comments what you think are the best comedy movies 2016 has offered up so far, and what you’re looking forward to.

Here’s the rundown of every significant theatrical release, good and bad:

– JANUARY –
Ride Along 2
Starring: Kevin Hart, Ice Cube, Ken Jeong, Benjamin Bratt, Olivia Munn, Tika Sumpter
Director: Tim Story
Out: 15 January 2016 (U.S. Dates)

Jumpy, fast-talking Ben (Hart) has graduated from police academy and is now an Atlanta P.D. cop, with dreams of making it as a detective. Grumpy James (Cube), his soon to be brother-in-law, is still annoyed by his tactics. But before Ben is able to marry James’s sister, their boss assigns them to a case in Miami, where they will be working with the Miami P.D. in order to bring down a powerful drug lord (Bratt). New additions include Ken Jeong as a slippery hacker turned informant, Olivia Munn as a Miami detective, and (strangely briefly) Tyrese Gibson as Cube’s partner during a bust. Director Tim Story returns. The passable first movie (which made an incredible $134m domestic) showed Hart and Cube were a good ‘opposites’ pairing with an entertaining dynamic. But with Cube’s “approval” won at the end of that, the plot here has pretty much no stakes whatsoever, other than what level of shenanigans they’ll get up to in Miami. The by-the-numbers screenplay is certainly lazier, trotting out ’90s buddy-action cliches about criminals and cops while giving Hart nothing clever to work with. There are a dozen or so amusing lines, but over ninety minutes that just isn’t good enough. Ultimately your enjoyment will once again depend on how much you’re a Hart fan. [Critics (via Rotten Tomatoes): 15%] [Public (via IMDB): 5.9] – Mediocre

Dirty Grandpa
Starring: Zac Efron, Robert De Niro, Aubrey Plaza, Zoey Deutch, Dermot Mulroney
Director: Dan Mazer
Out: 22 January 2016

Right before his wedding, an uptight guy (Efron) is tricked into driving his grandfather, a perverted foul-mouthed ex-Army general (De Niro), to Florida for spring break. Grandpa’s looking to score again after 15 years unlaid, and a super-skank (Plaza) might help him succeed. Meanwhile his grandson is starting to question if getting married isn’t feeling like more of a prison sentence… This is the year’s most underrated comedy. The director previously co-wrote ‘Bruno’ and ‘Borat’, and that influence is keenly felt here. The R-rated film starts like a deadweight, but when De Niro gets going he’s hilarious, if a couple of times humiliated. Seeing him wack off to an adult movie might be the low point of his career but within minutes he’s exclaiming that his nightmare would be Queen Latifah taking a dump in his mouth from a hot air balloon, with a delivery that no other actor could have matched. He’s a machine of full-on bad taste and, rather than lament his fall from prestigious grace as critics have done, I fully admire his commitment to this role. Indeed the film is the most filthy and un-pc I’ve seen in a long time (only bested by ‘Grimsby’, it’s quite a year), so if De Niro telling a story about Andre the Giant f****ring women or Zac Efron with a swastika of dicks inked on his forehead isn’t your thing, stay away. [Critics: 11%] [Public: 6.0] – Ok

50 Shades Of Black
Starring: Marlon Wayans, Kali Hawk, Jane Seymour, Fred Willard, Mike Epps
Director: Michael Tiddes
Out: 29 January 2016

Mysterious entrepreneur and control freak Christian Black (Marlon Wayans) starts up a kinky affair with an inexperienced woman (Kali Hawk – Adult Swim’s ‘Black Jesus’) who came to interview him… Parody of erotic romantic novel/film ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’, reuniting the team that made ‘A Haunted House 1 & 2′, including the director, and Wayans as co-writer. As pop culture moves so quickly, thanks to the ever increasing speed of communication, the references in the trailer – to ’50 Shades’, to ‘Magic Mike’, to Kim Kardashian’s champagne photoshoot – already feel old. Nonetheless, expect the usual assortment of high-pitch Marlon screams, fart gags and jokes about “white people”. Like Adam Sandler films, there’s a group who like Wayans comedies and a group that don’t. You already know which you’re in. ’50 Shades Of Grey’ was, unintentionally, amusing enough already. [Critics: 7%] [Public: 3.5] – Avoid

– FEBRUARY –
Hail Caesar!
Starring: Josh Brolin, Alden Ehrenreich, George Clooney, Tilda Swinton, Scarlett Johansson
Directors: Ethan Coen, Joel Coen
Out: 5 February 2016

A Hollywood fixer in the 1950s (Brolin, based on real-life MGM executive Eddie Mannix) works to keep the studio’s stars in line, keep their scandals out the press, and is now trying to discover what happened to the huge star (Clooney, in bumbling mode) who’s been kidnapped during the filming of ‘Hail, Caesar!’. Ehrenreich plays the onscreen cowboy making a wooden transition to a talking role and driving luvvie director Ralph Fiennes mad. Swinton plays a gossip columnist, Johansson is the star facing scandal after becoming pregnant from a fling, and Channing Tatum is a singing/dancing actor with an interesting sideline. Roger Deakins, probably the greatest cinematographer alive, rejoins the Coen Brothers, having previously worked with them on the likes of ‘True Grit’ and ‘Fargo’. If you don’t have an interest in the golden age of Hollywood then this is likely to be a drag because the primary pleasure here is seeing those period visuals recreated and having fun with the politics and studio system of the era. Most of the stars on the poster are little more than glorified cameos (Jonah Hill has one scene, Scarlett Johansson has three, Channing Tatum has three, etc). The story flow feels disjointed, like a series of vignettes tied together fairly awkwardly. It lacks forward drive, any real stakes, and it’s never hilarious, although some individual scenes (like Tatum’s dance number and Ehrenreich’s date at the cinema) are wonderfully done and moments of style run throughout. It’s no ‘Big Lebowski’. For cinephiles only. [Critics: 85%] [Public: 6.3] – Ok

Dad’s Army
Starring: Toby Jones, Bill Nighy, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Michael Gambon
Director: Oliver Parker
Out: 5 February 2016

It’s WW2 and the Brit Home Guard, Walmington-on-Sea division, stands ready to defend the UK in case of German invasion, regardless of the fact they are mostly bumbling pensioners ineligible for military service. By 1944 Captain Mainwaring’s (Jones) men are suffering from low morale, until a glamorous journalist (Zeta-Jones) arrives to report on the platoon’s exploits. Meanwhile, MI5 have discovered a radio signal transmitted from Walmington-on-Sea towards Berlin, apparently the work of a spy, giving the Home Guard a chance to make a real difference in the war… Based on the classic BBC sitcom that was in production from 1968 to 1977, and spawned a movie in 1971. The do-over comes from the writer and director of ‘Johnny English Reborn’. There’s nothing fundamentally wrong with the idea of rebooting the series, the concept remains potentially funny and endearing – but this is a very lacklustre effort. The plotting and writing are weak, the slapstick’s embarrassingly lame and the direction well below par (the bull chase and final shootout are among the most poorly staged sequences of the year). Catherine Zeta-Jones has a ridiculously large amount of screen time for her role, with scene after repetitive scene of the men individually trying to win her affection. Indeed for most of the running time she’s on screen more than Captain Mannering. This is at the expense of male bonding scenes and so we get little sense of the interpersonal relations between the squad. Toby Jones tries hard as Mannering but in the end he’s a dramatic not a comic actor. A curiosity for long time fans but no pleasure for anyone. [Critics: 31%] [Public: 5.2] – Mediocre

Deadpool
Starring: Ryan Reynolds, Ed Skrein, T.J. Miller, Morena Baccarin, Gina Carano
Director: Tim Miller
Out: 12 February 2016

Wade Wilson (Reynolds), an unhinged former Special Forces operative turned neighbourhood-duties mercenary, finds the love of his twisted life, but then discovers cancer is about to end it. Approached by a shadowy man, he agrees to become part of a super-soldier program in return for a cure. The torturous rogue experiment scars him severely, but gives him incredible agility and accelerated healing powers. When its sadistic overseer Ajax (Skrein), who cannot feel pain, reveals that Wade is actually being turned into a super-slave, Wade breaks free, adopts the alter ego Deadpool, and sets out for revenge – amidst a sea of quips and 4th wall breaking commentary. Soon he enlists the help of two X-Men: steel-skinned Colossus and energy conductor Negasonic Teenage Warhead… Ryan Reynolds reboots the role he had in ‘X-Men Origins: Wolverine’ with an infinitely more accurate version. The movie’s at its best whenever he’s in costume, with the unique shifting eyes of the mask doing a great job of conveying the comic character. The script comes from the writers of ‘Zombieland’ and their humour proves a great match for Reynolds and ‘Pool, with the amusing tongue-in-cheek commentary, sometimes about Marvel movies themselves, providing the perfect antidote to the increasingly serious-faced genre. The story itself is perhaps a little too straightforward, and much of the backstory is played as straight drama, but better that than a spoof. It does a good job of making someone near invulnerable in the comic seem vulnerable but could have carried over more of his split personality and the surreal, there’s a hint of those aspects toward the end. All in all it’s a chuckle-worthy R-rated escapade, that’s made an incredible amount of money at the box office. [Critics: 84%] [Public: 8.1] – Excellent

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Comedy Movies 2016

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